Brazil's Levy says financial tax needed to hit budget target

BRASILIA, Sept 14 (Reuters) - Brazil's Finance Minister Joaquim Levy said on Monday that the government needed to reinstate the CPMF financial transactions tax to deliver a fiscal surplus of 34.4 billion reais ($9 billion) before interest payments next year.

The government's previous efforts to bring back the unpopular CPMF tax were met with stiff resistance in Congress. Levy and Planning Minister Nelson Barbosa presented nearly 65 billion reais of proposed spending cuts and additional tax revenues to plug a primary deficit in the 2016 budget bill sent to Congress last week.